1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to online workflow software and management, and more particularly to a method and system for automated messaging in an online legal workflow tool.
2. Background Art
In today's legal arena, corporations, institutions and firm clients typically rely on multiple distributed firms and agencies to assist with or independently conduct their legal workflow. It is not uncommon for a single corporation to have several private law firms handling hundreds of co-pending legal matters ranging from basic transactional work to larger projects such as litigation, negotiation, etc. In the intellectual property area, for example, a corporation often relies on outside counsel to independently manage all searches and applications for trademarks, patents etc.
A variety of companies currently offer software applications for managing or otherwise automating workflow and associated knowledge in both the legal and non-legal arenas. One example is Aspen Grove's ipWorkflow. Aspen Grove is located at 101 Federal Street, Suite 1900, Boston, Mass. 02110 (www.aspengrove.net). Another example is offered by Vinsoft Solutions located at 1155 West Chestnut Street, Suite 2-C, Union, N.J. 07083 (www.vinsoftsolutions.com). Another example is offered by FoundationIP located at 830 TCF Tower, 121 South 8th Street, Minneapolis, Minn. 55402 (www.foundationip.com). Another example is Inproma offered by Computer Patent Annuities North America LLC located at 225 Reinekers Lane, Suite 400, Alexandria, Va. 22314 (www.cpajersey.com). Another example is offered by iManage located at 950 Tower Lane, Suite 500, Foster City, Calif. 94404 (www.imanage.com).
Embodiments and features of the present invention include an alternative to or valuable improvement upon conventional legal workflow applications. Without limiting the scope or applicability of the present invention, one goal of the present invention is to more-effectively reduce or eliminate unnecessary automated workflow messages. Conventional workflow applications often provide functionality for creating automated e-mail reminders or messages to workflow participants indicating that certain tasks or deadlines have come due. For certain types of workflow, however, a variety of inter-dependent tasks or deadlines may apply to a single workflow record or event.
By way of example in the intellectual property (patent) arena, the receipt of a patent examiner's office action on a pending US utility patent application may trigger the creation of four inter-related reminders—one reminder for the three-month deadline to respond to the office action, and three reminders thereafter for the available one, two and three-month extensions of time to respond. Notably, all of the created reminders are inter-related to the requisite task at issue (i.e. responding to the office action). Responding to the office action prior to the three-month deadline eliminates any need to seek the one, two or three-month extensions of time. Accordingly, any existing reminders associated with these dependent events become unnecessary when the requisite task or event at issue occurs.
A failure to eliminate or otherwise de-activate such dependent reminders, however, typically results in unnecessary user frustration. With the prevalence of e-mail spam and the ever-increasing integration of workflow management applications, user e-mail account management has already become somewhat time-consuming for most computer users. Receiving invalid workflow reminders only acts to compound this frustration. Further, the existence of such invalid reminders challenges user trust in and reliance upon valuable workflow management applications.
What is needed is a method and system for electronic workflow messaging that effectively reduces or otherwise eliminates/de-activates unnecessary workflow reminders.